Buckle up if you you haven’t done so already as TNA Wrestling has just been sued again. In addition to the lawsuit just filed by Billy Corgan, TNA’s former production company is suing as well.
Audience of One Productions filed suit against iMPACT! Wrestling Ventures LLC, TNA’s minority owner Aroluxe LLC, Dean Broadhead and Ronald Harris all sued on September 27th. The lawsuit is for “breach of contract, fraudulent inducement on the behalf of Harris and Broadhead, torturous interference on behalf of Aroluxe and for violating Virginia codes”. AO1 is also seeking $223,000 plus interests and post-judgment costs.
The AO1 lawsuit claims the company entered into discussions with TNA Wrestling in 2015 about a potential long-term agreement in which AO1 would provide production work including “audio/visual and broadcasting work, lighting, set construction and breakdown, as well as retention and payment of audience ‘wranglers’ (personnel who would patrol the crowd and try to engage audience members with the event), among other things.” Before the point that the Harris brothers were overseeing production and“were not providing sufficiently high-quality production work to TNA, despite their industry experience,” according to a source.
AO1 began working with TNA on the Universal Studios tapings and per the suit, “Broadhead and Ron Harris consistently represented to AOl that these two events were the first of many and that TNA and AOl were on the verge of a long and fruitful relationship.” They produced Bound For Glory for the company and billed them in October $223,000 for the services rendered; the month after, Broadhead emailed them saying that TNA was at work to finalize a new broadcast deal that would put them in 80 million homes and said, “We are planning to go back into Universal Studios in 2016 and get back on the right track with our production. Please, please hang in there with us. We will come out of these difficult times in a much better position as a company and a partner.” According to A01, the email was sent to keep them from perusing more aggressive collection attempt.
A01 also sent a second invoice in November with a 1.5% late fee. At that point, Ron Harris once asked for an itemized invoice. In January they lowered the amount owed by about $29,000 as Dean Broadhead directly paid some of the independent contractors. AO1 claims that TNA did so in order to make sure those contractors would continue to work for TNA after ties were cut. Broadhead then began talking with them about a payment plan, agreeing that the money would be paid in monthly installments from March 2016 through August 2016. The suit states, “Upon information and belief, TNA’s financial troubles had become increasingly severe by this time. Yet, here again, Broadhead, who would have been intimately familiar with those financial troubles, failed to share any relevant information with AOl, which, for its part, continued to negotiate in good faith with TNA and Broadhead over repayment terms for the BFG Event.”
In March, per AO1, “Aroluxe provided some form of financing to TNA which, upon information and belief, was sufficient to allow TNA to continue operating for the foreseeable future. This financing was secured with a lien on all or nearly all of TNA’s assets, including, but not limited to, all accounts receivable as well as all fixtures, inventory, and equipment.” The suit alleges that the financing gave Aroluxe, and this the Harris brothers, “considerable incentive to oversee and coordinate TNA’s financial affairs going forward.”
On March 18th, TNA was supposed to wire the first payment Broadhead told them that the money couldn’t be wired. it was later received via FedEx and AO1 says, “Upon information and belief, this failure to make a timely wire transfer to AOl resulted from intervention by Aroluxe and/or Ron Harris who, at this point, had every incentive to disrupt and delay payments to AOl so that other creditors could be paid sooner.”
TNA has not responded to invoices regarding money owed to A01 since.
